An introverted archeologist finds out the hard way that she must be a fugitive in her own country to expose an international syndicate’s deadly conspiracy to topple governments and break conglomerates.

SYNOPSIS:

LOG LINE and SYNOPSIS FOR “The fugitive.”

Based on a Swahili novel, titled “MKIMBIZI.”

Set in the contemporary East Africa’s country of Tanzania, THE FUGITIVE, follows an explosive story of TIGGA MUMBA, an introverted archaeologist (27) who inadvertently witnesses and video tapes MARTIN LUNDI and Judge OBEID SHENDASHONGA, as they brutally torture and eventually murder, a nameless man in a deep forest in central Tanzania, where she was part of an archaeological expedition with her coworkers.

Before dying, the nameless man leaves her with three mysterious words - “Find the Bastard”, “Get the Key”, and some meaningless numbers that he writes for her on the ground. Agitated, Tigga runs back to the expedition site and finds all her coworkers massacred.

She runs back to a small town of Manyoni, and barges bare chest into the District Commissioner’s office to report the incident but is shocked to find Martin Lundi waiting for her there, claiming to be her psychiatrist. He tells her that she is a paranoid schizophrenic, and that she is the one who massacred her coworkers in the forest.

Tigga wreaks havoc at the DC’s office and escapes. She smuggles herself back into the city (Dar es Salaam) where her fiancé, deceived by Martin Lundi, lays a trap for her. Martin Lundi and his goons catch her again. She creates a confusion by tripping a faulty electric switch that plunges the house in darkness and flees. However, in the struggle and confusion that ensued, her fiancé is shot and killed. She is as well blamed for the murder of her fiancé.

As she embarks on a treacherous quest to exonerate herself by finding the answers to all the questions surrounding the torture and massacre that happened in the forest, JOHN VATA, a no-nonsense, soft spoken Police Commissioner, is close at her heels seeking to bring her to justice. So is the relentless Martin Lundi and his gang, who seek to get the evidence of the murder from her and silence her for good.

She takes refuge at her mother’s place and bitterly finds out that the same trap is set against her by her mother. This realization changes her entire sense of belonging. She understands then that she has only herself to rely on. She finds herself pitted against a highly resourceful syndicate. She runs away from her mother’s place before Martin Lundi arrives. Meanwhile, her elder sister KOKU, a loyal public servant and a good judge of character gives Tigga John’s telephone number and advises her to work with him. However, Tigga pays no heed and goes it alone.

Using wit, ingenuity, and outright perseverance, Tigga solves the mystery of “The Bastard”, who turns out to be the nameless man’s half-sister; and finds out from her that the man’s name was CHRISTUS MACHIBYA. She also finds out that it is The Bastard who holds the “key” to a post- office box, whose box number was written for her on the ground by Christus Machibya. The Bastard, distraught by the fate of her half-brother, gives Tigga the key to the post-office box. At the post-office box, Tigga makes a last-minute decision not to collect the enveloped diary addressed to Christus Machibya, and instead, picks an unimportant envelope from the box.

As she leaves the post office with the envelope in hand, THE VIRUS, a gay and ruthless international killer, attacks her, and disappears with the bogus envelope, leaving her unconscious on the sidewalk. When she comes to, Tigga staggers back to the post-office box and collects the real evidence, which is a diary addressed to Christus Machibya.

From reading the diary, Tigga realizes that Christus Machibya had found out that the refugee camp he was working in, was an international syndicate’s grooming ground for terrorist factions, and that his finding out about this puts his life in danger. Tigga learns that Christus decided to mail the diary to himself, via his sister’s mailing address for hopes of escaping and finding the diary in Dar es Salaam but obviously the syndicate caught him before he could escape.

Using the diary as her beacon, Tigga travels to Zanzibar Island to meet a judge who was mentioned in Christus’ diary as a key player in the syndicate’s operations, but then The Virus blows the judge’s car, killing him. Tigga runs back to Dar es Salaam and is once again captured by Martin Lundi. Under captivity, she manages to snatch one of her captors’ phone and call John Vata, asking for his help. To foil John’s attempt to rescue her, The Virus blows the building they were in, and John Vata is presumed dead.

Devastated about John’s death, Tigga forges alone while all along, a badly injured John Vata tracks her down. They are eventually and dramatically reunited and team up against Judge Obeid’s syndicate.

Using the evidence from both the video tape Tigga recorded in the forest and Christus Machibya’s diary, John Vata puts up an operation that rounds up Judge Obeid’s syndicate and kills The Virus. Tigga becomes the state’s witness in a case against Judge Obeid and his followers.

Meanwhile, the flame that has always been held at bay between the two, flares up and Tigga finds herself in John’s loving arms.

* End of Synopsis. *

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